21 killed by suicide bomber in =Pakistan

PESHAWAR, Pakistan - An explosion in a market in northwestern Pakistan yesterday killed at least 21 people and wounded 33 in what police described as a suicide bombing.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — An explosion in a market in northwestern Pakistan yesterday killed at least 21 people and wounded 33 in what police described as a suicide bombing.

The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack in Hangu, about 70 miles west of Peshawar. Abu Omar, a Taliban commander in the tribal region of North Waziristan, said the attack was in revenge for the killing of a Sunni cleric.

The cleric, Mufti Abdul Majeed Deenpuri, 60, was shot on Thursday in the southern port city of Karachi, setting off fears of reprisals against Shiites.

Deenpuri was a senior teacher at Jamia Binoria, one of the largest seminaries in Pakistan. A gunman opened fire on the vehicle carrying the cleric and a colleague at a busy intersection and then fled.

While the security situation is precarious across Pakistan, Rehman Malik, the interior minister, had warned of the potential for an attack in Karachi. Cellphone services were suspended in the sprawling, violence-prone port city from noon to 3 p.m. during Friday prayer.

Sectarian violence has also occurred in Hangu, often forcing the authorities to impose a curfew. The town borders the Orakzai tribal region, where the army and paramilitary forces are fighting Taliban militants.

A police official in Hangu said that a suicide bomber detonated his explosives. While Shiites were the likely target, the dead included people from both Islamic sects, he said.

Separately, a Pakistani intelligence official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said 30 mortar shells fired from Afghanistan yesterday killed six residents of Angoor Adda, a village in South Waziristan. There was no official comment from the Pakistani military, and a local official gave a conflicting number of casualties.

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